Could Toni P. someday be head of local regular Democratic organization?

It was just one week ago that some people were convinced that Toni Preckwinkle was a political has-been.

PRECKWINKLE: Soon to be the new boss?

The Cook County Board president, after all, was the woman whom the electorate was going to revolt because of the “pop tax” – that penny-per-ounce fee on sweetened beverages that she lobbied for, but that the county commissioners eventually repealed.

IT SEEMS THAT Cook County residents weren’t as worked up about that tax as some ideologues wanted to believe. Either that, or the fact that she ran against a political mediocrity like Robert Fioretti gave her a victory in last week’s Democratic primary.

With her fate assured for the next four years (there isn’t a serious Republican challenger for the Nov. 6 general election), the long-time alderman from Hyde Park turned eight-years-and-running county president wants to strengthen her post.

Such as her public statement Friday that she wants to become the new chairwoman of the Cook County Democratic Party – a post that some local political watchers believe is more significant than that of the Illinois Democratic Party chairman (because local is ALWAYS more important than state).

The post is open because of another electoral result from Tuesday – the defeat of Cook County Assessor Joe Berrios. He’s the man who has been county Democratic boss since 2007.

BERRIOS: Will Toni friendship last?

BUT HIS DEFEAT as assessor undermines his ability to keep the Democratic Party post. Why should the Democratic Party’s local organization keep as its boss a guy who couldn’t even win re-election?

Which has Preckwinkle publicly saying she’s willing to challenge Berrios for the position that enhances his political party.

Consider Richard J. Daley, who may have committed many significant acts toward the long-term future of Chicago as mayor. But it was the fact that he doubled as the Democratic Chairman that gave him the power to keep getting re-elected as mayor, and also to have an influence that caused national Democrats to care what he thought.

In short, it wasn’t the “Mayor of Chicago” that John F. Kennedy sought out when he ran for the presidency in 1960 – it was the “Democratic chairman” who turned out all those hundreds of thousands of votes that resulted in Illinois’ electoral college going into the JFK column, rather than for Richard Nixon.

Would JFK have sought Daley if he weren't chair

HECK, IT CAN be argued that it was the fact that Edward R. Vrdolyak served as Democratic chairman from 1982-87 that gave him the power to influence a council majority to openly defy Harold Washington during much of his mayoral term.

Other significant names to serve as Democratic chairman for Cook County include George Dunne, Jacob Arvey, Edward J. Kelly and Anton Cermak – the latter of whom used the party chairman post to rise to being Chicago mayor.

This will be the class of politicos that Preckwinkle would elevate herself to – IF she can become the Democratic chairwoman for the county of Cook.

She’d be the first woman to hold the post, although she’d be replacing the man who was the first Latino to ever hold the post. Depending on how strongly Berrios would want to hang onto political power, this could become an ethnically-inspired political brawl.

ALTHOUGH IT COULD wind up that the political elements wishing to elevate the number of women holding political posts could rise up to fight for Preckwinkle. It would be something of an achievement if the el jefe of Cook County Democrats became a la jefa.

CERMAK: Used post to become mayor

Kind of odd, since Preckwinkle herself was a Berrios backer. She constantly spoke out on behalf of retaining Joe as county assessor; even when others were bashing him about for all the family members on his government payroll and allegations that he gave tax breaks to his political donors.

So now, by saying she wants to replace Joe Berrios, Toni Preckwinkle is turning on him at his lowest moment. Which may illustrate a reality of electoral politics.

Political allies are friends so long as they can do something for your – and no longer! Not bad for somebody who some people wanted to believe would be political history by now.

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What can we learn about Chuy from last Little Village neighborhood mayor?

When Barack Obama became president-elect in 2008, I spent the next few weeks re-reading everything I could get my hands on concerning Harold Washington and “Council Wars;” suspecting that Republican reaction to an Obama presidency would bear similarities to the hostilities Washington faced from the City Council.

Some of that background has come in handy throughout the years, even though the modern-day GOP is slightly more subtle in its rhetoric than the Vrdolyak caucus was when expressing its racial contempt for Chicago’s first black man elected to be mayor.

WHICH HAS ME wondering if there are lessons from history that can be learned about what kind of mayor Jesus “Chuy” Garcia would be, should it somehow turn out that he gets himself elected on April 7 as the city’s first Latino (Mexican-American, to be precise) chief executive.

Specifically, I’m wondering about the story of Anton Cermak – whom I’m sure some people only know of as the guy for whom 22^nd Street was renamed following his death in 1933.

A part of me sees similarities between former Mayor Cermak and Garcia and wonders if there is some larger lesson that can be learned about what kind of public official we would get should voters decide to make Chuy our mayor.

Now I’m sure some people will claim there is nothing in common between the two men. But I see similarities, and not just because both Garcia and Cermak came out of the same Little Village neighborhood southwest of downtown.

BACK IN CERMAK’S time, Little Village and Pilsen were eastern European enclaves – which is why it was natural that when Austria-Hungary-born Cermak came to Chicago, he settled there.

Why also it became the base on which he got elected in the early 20^th Century to the Illinois House of Representatives, the City Council and then the Cook County Board where he moved up to being county board president. Garcia also is a pol who has served as alderman, state senator and county commissioner -- prior to running for mayor.

It was a collection of immigrant families who felt they were being ignored by the political establishment of the time that ultimately backed Cermak’s desire to be mayor in 1931.

Just as how now it seems to be a collection of immigrant families (albeit from the Americas instead of eastern European nations) who are the base of those who want Garcia to succeed in his mayoral aspirations against a candidate whom they feel ignores their concerns and is too focused on an elite of Chicago.

OF COURSE, TIMES change. Situations evolve. Back when Cermak made his mayoral bid, the political establishment was Irish and not interested in sharing much of anything with other Chicagoans.

Then-Mayor William Hale Thompson seemed unwilling to listen to others, and tried dismissing Cermak’s candidacy by attacking his credibility because he was so ethnic. A “bohunk,” to use the terminology of the time. “Pushcart Tony.” The guy who should be delivering your vegetables, rather than running the city.

I’m sure we’re going to get our share of tacky one-liners in coming weeks about how ridiculous it is to have a “filthy Mexican” in charge, instead of just contacting federal immigration officers to have him deported.

Let’s hope the mayor has enough sense not to go down that path himself, although I’m sure there will be political operatives willing to do just that.

CERMAK OVERCAME ETHNIC hostility by putting together a political coalition of people from all the ethnic and racial groups in Chicago whom the white Irish establishment didn’t want to bother with. It wound up being enough to win him re-election, and was the origin of the current political “machine” in Chicago that got Emanuel elected in 2011.

Garcia’s chances of winning could well be because he could unite the Latino population that accounts for about 30 percent of city residents with those African-American residents and even white ethnics who feel they have been forgotten about at City Hall.

For all I know, the matter may well be the descendants of the people who 84 years ago gave us “Mayor Cermak!” Which would be the ultimate bit of irony if it took this city’s diverse ethnic composition to help revamp the city political structure that it created way back when.

Garcia has implied that if elected mayor, he wants to put an emphasis on the neighborhoods, and in getting more police officers hired. Similar to how Cermak used his own political influence to get the then-brand-new Criminal Court building erected in his home neighborhood.

WHICH WOULD BE different from the string of mayors we have had for decades. Both Richard J. and M. Daley got hit with the same criticisms about favoring “the Loop” over the neighborhoods that we now hear aimed at Emanuel.

Could it take a Garcia to give Little Village (or perhaps we should now call it La Villita?) something for its character, other than living in the shadow of the county courthouse and jail?

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EDITOR’S NOTE: Personally, I find author Gary Rivlin’s book “Fire on the Prairie” to be the best in telling the story of black political empowerment in Chicago and the days of “Council Wars.” If anyone has any suggestions of worthy books about the Cermak days, I’d be interested in knowing of them.